


Sleep Paralysis

by meanderingsoul



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Angst, Episode Tag, F/M, Introspection, Past Relationship(s), Season/Series 06, Touching, Watching
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-24
Updated: 2019-06-24
Packaged: 2020-05-18 23:49:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 432
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19345201
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meanderingsoul/pseuds/meanderingsoul
Summary: It was too easy to pretend while he was sleeping.





	Sleep Paralysis

**Author's Note:**

> This is an episode tag from May's pov for 6x05. That was a hell of an episode for her. We got to see a lot of her amazing skillset as an agent and some badly repressed memories. I had feelings.

 

After a couple miles May pulled the truck over, re-secured both prisoners with sturdier ties, checked local channels to make sure no one had called in a reckless driver or anything similar for the truck, called in to HQ that she’d made the capture and was driving north to them. The green agent on the phone had sounded relieved.

 _He_  hadn’t woken up yet. She tried not to look again. She hadn’t been able to stop herself setting his arm folded against his belly, so the elbow wouldn’t hurt. That was already bad enough.

It was too easy to pretend while he was sleeping.

 _He_  was flesh and blood. No denying that now, red bruises coming in on his scalp, bandaged cut on his hand, warm as she bound his wrists together.

May licked blood off the inside of her lips again, but her fingers lingered on his skin. She couldn’t help it.

It just felt like skin. The knuckles she was staring at would bruise eventually. She knew they would. It wasn’t like Phil had never hit her before, sparring or disorientation, but never like that. These were someone else’s hands. She couldn’t possibly recognize those four freckles.

May closed her eyes. Warm, living skin.

The last time she’d touched Phil it hadn’t been.

It was dark this far out, badly maintained highway and overworked fields. One orange streetlight half a mile away. The gauges in this rig didn’t make any sense, but they hadn’t stopped for fuel once the entire time it had been here. This thing ran on something else. It should reach the Lighthouse just fine. Benson could take a look at it, maybe.

She just had to start driving. Her hands squeezed the wheel, knuckles white under the blood.

May looked again.

He could just be sleeping. Without talking or moving, in the faint light it could just be Phil sleeping in the passenger seat. She’d seen that so many times. That was the same peaceful little frown, same lines on his face, same short, dark lashes so much easier to see with his eyes closed. He even almost smelled the same.

But  _he_  didn’t move like Phil.  _He_  didn’t talk like Phil, not in the ways that mattered most. It was too easy to pretend while he was sleeping.

May closed her eyes. Opened them again. The nightmare didn’t change.

There wasn’t anything to dream about anymore. She couldn’t afford to hope for anything else, to remember anything else. All that was done.

May put the lever back where it had been and started to drive.

 


End file.
